Paramount doesn't control my mind. Since when did we ever need Paramount to tell us what to like?

See, this is the kind of misapprehension that comes up when you mistake the word "canon" for the concept of "what is real/acceptable." That's just not what it means. Canon is not about telling the fans what to accept. Fans can accept or reject whatever they want. Canon has nothing whatsoever to do with the fans. Nor is canon about telling the makers of the shows and films what stories they can tell, because the makers of new canon are free to retcon or ignore past canon. The only people who are actually restricted by canon in any way are people like me, who write tie-in works, because we're obliged to conform to it and don't have the freedom to ignore it. (At least not in the licensed fiction we write. As a fan, I build my own personal continuity that includes a lot of non-canonical tie-in works and excludes some canonical episodes.)

And nobody is trying to "tell you what to like" except you. CBS (not Paramount anymore) doesn't want to tell anyone "You can't buy these stories anymore because they don't fit with these other stories." That would be self-defeating. I mean, think about it. Why does CBS (formerly Paramount) produce Star Trek shows and movies and license Star Trek tie-in books and comics and games? To make money. The more stuff you buy, the more money they make. So they want you to buy all of it, regardless of what continuity it's in. They're not going to tell you not to buy something that's not in continuity anymore, because that would be against their own financial interest. Indeed, having multiple continuities is good for them financially, because that means they can appeal to a wider range of audiences, since someone who doesn't enjoy one continuity can still be drawn in by a different one.

And most of the audience doesn't worry that much about continuity; they just want to read adventures of the characters they like. If different adventures are inconsistent with each other, big deal; they're all made-up stories anyway, all equally unreal, so all that should matter is whether they're entertaining. It's only a small minority of fans who think that canon and continuity have a bearing on what stories they should enjoy. That's not Paramount or CBS imposing anything on you. That's just you imposing a set of assumptions on yourself.

Why does it bother you so much Chris? You seem to expel a lot of energy on these exercises.

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People in third world countries are so lucky they don't have to deal with these problems. - TheGodBen